Bodies of fallen soldiers, journalist, heading back to Canada

Matthew Fisher, Canwest News Service01.02.2010

Some soldiers wept openly as several thousand mourners turned out on January 1, 2010 to salute and say a final goodbye to Calgary Herald journalist Michelle Lang and four Canadian soldiers who were killed Wednesday when their armoured vehicle drove over a homemade landmine.Matthew Fisher
/ Canwest News Service

Soldiers and diplomats carry the casket of journalist Michelle Lang to a transport aircraft on New Year's Day while other troops carry caskets of four other soldiers slain two days ago in an IED strike. Several thousand soldiers saluted Lang and their fallen comrades before they began their 10,000 kilometre journey home.Sgt. Gemma Bibby of the Royal Air Force
/ DND

A Canadian soldier says goodbye to a fallen comrade on New Year's Day before he and three comrades as well as journalist Michelle Lang of the Calgary Herald begin their 10,000 kilometre journey back to Canada.Sgt. Gemma Bibby of the Royal Air Force
/ DND

The casket of journalist Michelle Lang of the Calgary Herald is carried into the belly of a military transport aircraft on New Year's Day to begin the 10,000 kilometre journey back to Canada.Matthew Fisher
/ Canwest News Service

Journalist Michelle Lang's casket is the first of five slain Canadians to be carried by pallbearers into a military transport aircraft New Year's Day to begin the 10,000 kilometre to Canada.
Lang, of the Calgary Herald, and four Canadian soldiers were killed Wednesday when their armoured vehicle stuck a homemade landmine while returning from a patrol near Kandahar City.Sgt. Gemma Bibby of the Royal Air Force
/ DND

Pallbearers wait on New Year's Day to move five Canadians slain from light armoured vehicles to a military transport to begin the 10,000 kilometre journey home to Canada as several thousand NATO soldiers saluted them.
Journalist Michelle Lang of the Calgary Herald and four Canadian soldiers with the Provincial Reconstruction Team were killed Wednesday when their vehicle struck an improvised explosive device.Sgt. Gemma Bibby of the Royal Air Force
/ DND

Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan - The flag-draped caskets of journalist Michelle Lang and four Canadian soldiers, who died in an explosion caused by a homemade landmine on Wednesday, were solemnly borne by pallbearers to a C-130 Hercules transport on New Year¹s Day to begin the 10,000 kilometre journey home.Matthew Fisher
/ Canwest News Service

Calgary Herald reporter Michelle Lang, seen in this 2005 file photo, was killed by an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan Dec. 30, 2009, while covering the war for the Canwest News Service. Four Canadian soldiers also died in the blast.Colleen De Neve
/ Calgary Herald

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KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan — As thousands of soldiers saluted and a lone piper played a sad lament on New Year’s Day, the flag-draped caskets of journalist Michelle Lang and four Canadian soldiers were solemnly placed on a C-130 Hercules transport aircraft to begin the 10,000 kilometre journey back to Canada.

Lang, 34, a reporter for the Calgary Herald covering Afghanistan for Canwest News Service, was near the end of her first patrol, Wednesday afternoon when a massive homemade landmine mine blew up under the light armoured vehicle that she was riding in on a muddy dirt road on Kandahar City’s southern outskirts.

Also killed in the first attack ever in that particular area, where the city gives way to countryside, were Pte. Garrett William Chidley, 21, of Cambridge, Ont. and Langley B.C. and 2 Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry Regiment of Shilo, Man.; Cpl. Zachery McCormack, 21, an Edmontonian with the Loyal Edmonton Regiment; Sgt. George Miok, 28, also of Edmonton and 41 Combat Engineer Regiment; and Sgt. Kirk Taylor, 28, of Yarmouth, Nova Scotia and its 84 Independent Field Battery, Royal Canadian Artillery.

“Wednesday, 30 December, 2009, was a dark day for Canada,” said Capt. Sandy Scott, an army padre from Saskatoon who spoke to the gathering on the ramp. “But the light that brings life to the world will never allow the powers of darkness to overcome the light of Canadians like these.

“Empowered by the God who brings light out of darkness, we as members of Canada’s army, navy and air force will never let . . . our country’s character be defeated by sinister or treacherous acts.”

Against a loud backdrop of sounds from the air war that were provided by a procession of fighter and transport aircraft, drones and helicopters, Scott shared deeply moving vignettes about each of the dead.

Lang had spoken only a few days ago to the padre about “her fiance, Michael Louie, and her love for her family and a grandfather who had been a railroader.” McCormack was described by Scott as being especially close to his fiance, Nicole, and his parents and family. Miok, a math and phys-ed teacher in junior high school back in the civilian world, was “a progressive leader” who “never spoke down to his soldiers and encouraged them to think for themselves,” Scott said. Like many Maritimers, Scott said that Taylor had “a calm demeanour and a great sense of humour and warmth” and “loved and was loved” by Felicia Dawn Raymond, his girlfriend, and his mother, Christina Smith. Chidley was known as Chiddels, “a quiet professional” who “knew his (light armoured vehicle) so well he could diagnose a problem through touch, sight or sound.”

Four other soldiers, a translator and a diplomat were injured during Wednesday’s attack, which came near dusk as the patrol was returning to Canada’s Provincial Reconstruction base in the provincial capital.

On Friday, Taylor’s family released a statement written by the sergeant in case he was killed.

“I believe that the mission in Afghanistan is vital for us not only as Canadians but as human beings, what we are doing is trying to help Afghans develop solutions to Afghan problems and to help them help themselves,” Taylor wrote. “Build today for a better tomorrow. This will not be accomplished overnight, but neither was Rome built in a day.”

It was an usually warm and sunny winter’s day as the cortege of five Canadian armoured vehicles crept silently across the tarmac to a point where eight pallbearers had gathered to carry the caskets about 100 metres to the aircraft.

Lang’s casket was the first in the procession, followed by those of the four soldiers whose berets were laid atop the flags alongside the Sacrifice Medals that they have been awarded posthumously. Canada’s military gave Lang the same honours usually given fallen soldiers.

The lead pallbearers for Lang were Lt. (N) Michele Tremblay of the military’s public affairs branch and Renee Filiatrault, a public affairs specialist with Foreign Affairs. Other pallbearers were Farhan Lahani, DFAIT’s spokesman at the PRT, Sgt. Renay Groves, who has written memorials about Canada’s fallen in Afghanistan, Capt. Yves Desbien, MCpl. Claude Arsenault and MCpl. Owen Budge of military public affairs and Sgt. Stephen Decater, a U.S. army public affairs specialist serving under Canadian command in Kandahar along with about 2,000 other U.S. troops.

The 32 pallbearers for the four soldiers who died were borne by members of their respective units.

Before the ramp ceremony a private memorial service has held near the Canadian headquarters where a marble monument carries etched images of all those who have fallen in what is Canada’s first major military conflict since the Korean War.

During that informal gathering, which lasted several hours as hundreds of soldiers came to pay their respects, Lang’s casket was adorned with her photo, a black scarf and a note pad and pencil that was a poignant tribute to her craft.

Friday’s ramp ceremony was attended by long, serried rows of troops from a dozen NATO nations, including most of the 1,000 or so Canadians based at the airfield, which is the logistical hub for the war in the south. Among the mourners was Canada’s task force commander, Brig.-Gen. Dan Menard.

Of the 138 soldiers who have died in Afghanistan since 2002, 83 of them were killed by improvised explosive devices such as the one used on Wednesday.

Two civilians have died in Kandahar. In addition to Lang, Welsh-born Canadian diplomat Glyn Berry, 60, was killed in January, 2005, when a suicide bomber drove his car into Berry’s military convoy.

Three of those who died — McCormack, Miok and Taylor — were reservists rather than full-time soldiers. Their deaths and those of seven other reservists have underscored how critical reservists have become to the Canadian mission, which has been severely stretched by manpower shortages and repeated deployments.

The four military deaths on Wednesday, brought to 32 the number of Canadian soldiers to have died in 2009, the same number as in 2008.

The highest annual death toll was 36 in 2006.

Lang was the first Canadian journalist to have died in Afghanistan. A medical reporter for the Calgary Herald, she had gone to the PRT in Kandahar City to report on some of Canada’s many humanitarian projects. Lang had arrived in Kandahar on December 11 for what was to have been a six-week tour of duty.

On Friday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper spoke with Afghan President Hamid Karzai about the two recent attacks.

“President Karzai called the prime minister to convey his condolences over the recent death of six Canadians, highlighting that Canada has been a good friend to the Afghan people,” said a statement from Harper’s office.

“President Karzai asked the prime minister to share his deepest condolences with the families of those who lost their lives and all Canadian people.”

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